Smoky Mountain Wrestling

Smoky Mountain Wrestling (SMW) was a promotion that stood apart from all others in the post-Hulkamania bust of the grap game. Envisaged by legendary manager Jim Cornette and funded by music bigwig Rick Rubin, the promotion promised fans old-school wrestling in the vein of the territorial wars of the Sixties and Seventies.

SMW's biggest supercard was the 'Superbowl of Wrestling', which drew over 5,000 fans to see WWF stars such as Shawn Michaels and the Undertaker do battle with the best SMW had to offer. The other major angle of the time was the introduction of The Gangstas (Mustafa Saed and New Jack prior making it big in ECW) and them getting over as monster heels with their racist pro-black schtick, which saw them pretty much take on the whole of SMW.

Sadly, even though the standard of wrestling was far surpassing anything that the WWF was doing at the time, the crowds grew tired of the old-school regional gimmick, and it was left to Jerry 'The King' Lawler's USWA to drive the final nail in the coffin, when his boy Jeff Jarrett beat Jesse James Armstrong for control of the two companies in 1995.

After SMW folded, Cornette took up a full-time position with the WWF (which he holds to this day), and the roster went their seperate ways - some to find fame and fortune, others to obscurity.